All-round Mishra guides UP into Syed Mushtaq Ali final

Eklavya Dwivedi masterminded a thrilling chase against Delhi, with an unbeaten 49 off 35 deliveries, to maintain Uttar Pradesh's unbeaten run in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2015-16 and secure their place in the final, on Monday (January 18) at the Bandra-Kurla Complex Ground in Mumbai.

Delhi's three-wicket defeat proved a party-spoiler for Gujarat, who had earlier in the day, comprehensively beaten Jharkhand to make the final encounter of Super League Group B a must-win for Uttar Pradesh.

The equation was simple when Uttar Pradesh walked out to bat; they needed an outright win to qualify, while Delhi had to restrict Uttar Pradesh to an unlikely score of 85 in 20 overs. However, a tactic which skipper Suresh Raina had professed for so long in the tournament of 'not losing too many wickets in the Powerplay overs' was thrown out of the window as the UP top-order played audacious shots to get themselves out.

Navdeep Saini had set the tone early on in the innings by breaching through the defences of Prashant Gupta. Samarth Singh, his opening partner, followed him back to the dressing room by offering an easy catch to Gautam Gambhir off Parvinder Awana.

Raina, who was middling the ball well, fell top-edging to Manan Sharma after his 18-ball cameo of 22. Even as Dwivedi hung around, piercing gaps and getting the scoreboard to move at a pace of over run-a-ball, wickets continued to fall from the other end. Akshdeep Nath (16), Piyush Chawla (10) and Praveen Kumar (18) gave him good company, but the target kept getting stiffer.

A match that for so long, seemed headed in Delhi's favour and offered the defending champions a chance to their second consecutive final, turned on its head in the penultimate over, when Amit Mishra smashed Subodh Bhati, who had conceded only 12 runs off his three overs, with slog shots milking 19 runs off it.

Pawan Negi, who came on to bowl the last over, with 10 runs to defend, leaked them in just four balls as Raina's team made their way to the final with two balls to spare.

Earlier in the day, Uttar Pradesh won the toss and elected to field. Praveen Kumar started stingily, building up the necessary pressure which forced Gautam Gambhir to unleash their attack on the other bowlers. Amit Mishra benefited by their move as he gifted his wicket to Mishra.

UP bowlers took command of the innings from thereon, reducing Delhi to 105 for 6 in 14.5 overs. However, it was the seventh wicket pair of Negi (41 not out) and Manan Sharma (19 not out) which took Delhi to a respectable 158 for 6.

With Baroda qualifying from Group A, it is going to be a repeat of the 2013-14 season finale where the two sides met in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy summit clash.